12-06-2015, 10:59 AM
Thanks, Tony 
I had good results with an old laser printer (found in a skip, repaired and used for several years until the toner ran out!). Like you, I did two prints; it worked really very well. Having said that, modern laser printers are generally much less "dense" than this old beast, so it's likely that inkjets would do an equal or better job. My old Canon MP800 printer/scanner has two black ink tanks - one is dye and the other is pigment - and I wonder if the pigment-based ink would offer better opacity to the UV? An experiment for the future...
I've seen some interesting designs for UV light boxes that use UV LEDs rather than tubes. But using the sun is a great idea!
When I worked for a company that had the in-house facilities, we used a photographic method to transfer the artwork from a laser-printed master (just on plain paper) to a transparency. I remember their "darkroom" was a tiny cupboard under the stairs - happy days! It produced very dense artwork indeed - arguably more dense that was needed, but at least it meant that the timing of the UV exposure wasn't as critical. It was also good for backlit front panels and similar projects. From there, the next cupboard housed the standard RS tanks, along with an old Belfast sink. It was a satisfying process, and made a nice change from being stuck on the bench...
There is another possibility - PCB milling machines. For many years now, I've been patiently waiting for the price to become affordable, but no sign yet. Perhaps the coming of 3D printing will help, as most of the parts are shared? These really appeal to me because they also do the drilling - which is the part I always enjoyed least! The number of times I missed a hole, or didn't drill it out to the right size, and didn't spot this until I'd partially populated the PCB... But of course, it does produce PCBs that look different to normal - you do tend to leave a lot more copper on the PCB (not necessarily a bad thing).
Overall, making PCBs is good fun. Even if you're just doing the artwork to send out, there is a lot of "art" involved - especially if you're sticking to single-side and are trying to minimise board area while keeping the number of jumper links to a minimum. But, with care and planning, Veroboard can be pretty reasonable - certainly for audio frequencies. There are compromises, of course, but that's life
I had good results with an old laser printer (found in a skip, repaired and used for several years until the toner ran out!). Like you, I did two prints; it worked really very well. Having said that, modern laser printers are generally much less "dense" than this old beast, so it's likely that inkjets would do an equal or better job. My old Canon MP800 printer/scanner has two black ink tanks - one is dye and the other is pigment - and I wonder if the pigment-based ink would offer better opacity to the UV? An experiment for the future...
I've seen some interesting designs for UV light boxes that use UV LEDs rather than tubes. But using the sun is a great idea!
When I worked for a company that had the in-house facilities, we used a photographic method to transfer the artwork from a laser-printed master (just on plain paper) to a transparency. I remember their "darkroom" was a tiny cupboard under the stairs - happy days! It produced very dense artwork indeed - arguably more dense that was needed, but at least it meant that the timing of the UV exposure wasn't as critical. It was also good for backlit front panels and similar projects. From there, the next cupboard housed the standard RS tanks, along with an old Belfast sink. It was a satisfying process, and made a nice change from being stuck on the bench...
There is another possibility - PCB milling machines. For many years now, I've been patiently waiting for the price to become affordable, but no sign yet. Perhaps the coming of 3D printing will help, as most of the parts are shared? These really appeal to me because they also do the drilling - which is the part I always enjoyed least! The number of times I missed a hole, or didn't drill it out to the right size, and didn't spot this until I'd partially populated the PCB... But of course, it does produce PCBs that look different to normal - you do tend to leave a lot more copper on the PCB (not necessarily a bad thing).
Overall, making PCBs is good fun. Even if you're just doing the artwork to send out, there is a lot of "art" involved - especially if you're sticking to single-side and are trying to minimise board area while keeping the number of jumper links to a minimum. But, with care and planning, Veroboard can be pretty reasonable - certainly for audio frequencies. There are compromises, of course, but that's life
